Insights

Swiss watchmakers are well on their way to adopting digital trends, but face the challenge of providing a comprehensive digital customer experience.

Digital technologies have helped the Swiss watch industry through the Corona pandemic. But what does it look like now that retail stores are open again? How is the industry using digital channels? Where does it see potential for its own business? A survey by the auditing and consulting firm EY shows: The representatives of the Swiss watch industry have clear ideas about how they want to use the new possibilities offered by digitization discovered mostly during the pandemic, but they also hold different positions on individual application possibilities.

Two-thirds of the companies surveyed state that close and individualized customer contact should be maintained not only in sales stores, but also via all existing digital channels. Two-thirds also see great potential in the digital trade with used watches, the so-called pre-owned market. And 100% of the Swiss watch industry representatives surveyed believe that the accurate tracking and recording of the "lifecycle" of watches will have "great" or "medium" value for the watch industry. Blockchain could be one of these technologies, however connecting data set is often a solid alternative.

For the survey on digital trends in the Swiss watch industry, EY interviewed well-known watch groups, individual brands of groups, independent watch brands and watch retailers.